The Epic Column 11.19.07
Posted by Nathan Grayson on 11.19.2007
The Epic Column returns after quite a hiatus, but to what kind of existence? A differently structured one, that's for sure. This week: the history of the Western RPG as a lead in to a larger series about Japanese RPGs and Western RPGs. Also, bad Thanksgiving jokes!
Since everyone and their lesbian alien sex partner, er, dog is going to be covering Mass Effect this week, I figured I'd do something totally different and eschew my normal format altogether. Yes, I'm aware that Mass Effect will soon be eating away my free time in the same way the entire United States will be eating away the entire innocent, defenseless turkey race, but I don't want to write about Mass Effect until I've thoroughly consumed all the gameplay it has to offer. So instead, get ready to be educated about the differences between Japanese RPGs and their Western counterparts on the grounds of their respective pasts, presents, and possible futures – for a few weeks. This history/comparison will last a few installments of the column – this week's being Western RPGs' past.
And finally, remember that using chocobos in place of Thanksgiving turkeys – while illegal in Ivalice, Midgar, and many other places – is a practice wholly endorsed by this column.
Go west, young Dungeons and Dragons archetype
Chronologically speaking, the Western RPG appeared (randomly in some tall grass) before Japanese RPG standout Dragon Quest was even a twinkle in developer Chunsoft's metaphorical eye. This can be attributed to the fact that Dungeons & Dragons, the table-top RPG on which most videogame RPGs are based, was created in America. But even around the same time as D&D's release and subsequent popularity, people were already creating electronic RPGs. In 1974, Pedit5 was developed for a learning tool called the PLATO. It was extremely basic, but it can be marked as the beginning of a glorious era in gaming – without which, this column would not exist. UNIX-based Rogue was probably the most recognizable game to come out of this time period, however. It had very basic ASCII graphics and tended to be incredibly difficult. But despite (or maybe, thanks to) its sometimes unreasonable difficulty level Rogue's gameplay has transcended time, now manifesting itself in a sub-genre called the "Roguelike." Examples of Roguelikes include Izuna: The Unemployed Ninja on the Nintendo DS and pretty much any title in the Mysterious Dungeon series. Ironically, the aforementioned examples are Japanese-developed games. Cultural synergy!
In 1979, the first real computer-based RPG was released. Created by none other than Richard "Lord British" Garriott (creator of the Ultima games), it was titled Akalabeth. The game was had wire-frame graphics and was played from a first-person perspective – a viewpoint that would come to characterize Western RPGs for quite a while. The game was available exclusively on the Apple II; yes, that's right, Macs were actually viable gaming platforms back then. Haha, Macs.
One year later, Garriott summoned up his next game from beyond the void, Ultima I: The First Age of Darkness. Ultima quickly gained popularity, and became a series far lager than the totally unrelated RPG side of the Panzer Dragoon series, Panzer Dragoon Saga. Oh wait, Saga isn't a series at all. Did I just make you sad? Of nearly as much note is Wizardry: Proving Grounds of the Mad Overlord, which was released in 1981. It also became a sizeable series, and entered into a rivalry with Ultima until they teamed-up to defeat the final boss – the PC flight sim genre. Something had to have killed it, right? Ok, I just made that part up. Both games drew upon D&D as very obvious inspiration, but Ultima saw the player controlling a single character, while Wizardry opted to blur the lines between homage and outright copy by using a party system. Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to run for my life from a pack of enraged Wizardry fans. Help me!
Interplay's Tales of the Unknown Vol. 1: The Bard's Tale really brought Western style RPGs to a mainstream audience. It was a dungeon-crawler, and also Etrian Odyssey-tough (worthy of new curse words), but it nevertheless managed to attract many fans who lacked previous experience with the genre. It was truly a case of quality trumping all other qualities in a game, and people couldn't help but take notice. Not long after that, Dungeon Master launched on the Atari ST. It was notable because it incorporated a semi-real time battle system wherein the player ordered their characters to perform actions while enemies countered with actions of their own at the same time. The game also benefited from being in a pseudo-3D style not unlike early first-person shooters. Outside of its technical merits, story was a focal point in Dungeon Master, and its plot was written by a professional novelist. Riveting, indeed.
Might and Magic Book I: The Secret of the Inner Sanctum marked the beginning of another long-running series, and I bet you can't guess which one that was. The game world was enormous, and the player was allowed to explore it however they pleased. Additionally, the player could become good or evil, and portions of the game changed accordingly. As a big bonus to casual consumers, M&M (see what I did there?) was easier than the majority of other RPGs available at the time, so it sold like Acme products at a Wile E. Coyote convention; fortunately, it didn't cause its buyers to be humiliatingly defeated by an improbably agile road runner.
1994, 1993's elder, was a banner year for some scrolls and an arena. Elder Scrolls: Arena was the first title in Bethesda's series that is still quite recognizable today. Arena had one of the largest worlds available in an RPG yet, and the number of places to explore was positively daunting. Although its main quest was pretty rigid, the game world redefined freedom in Western RPGs – even allowing players to steal from merchants if they so desired. The series grew throughout the years with Daggerfall, Morrowind, and most recently, Oblivion.
Chilly winds blew onto the Western RPG scene in 1996 with the release of Diablo. Ironically, the game, which took place in a place supposedly in a state of constant conflagration, was created by Blizzard. It almost single-handedly ushered in a new era in RPG popularity by reducing the complexity of the genre significantly. Gone were convoluted character-building systems, replaced with simple yet crucial skill choices. Combat was in real time, but unlike Dungeon Master, the player only controlled a single character and clicked repeatedly on the enemy they wanted to attack instead of giving orders. Taken as a whole, it created a more viscerally involving experience than previous RPGs. Other developers took the idea and ran with it, and the action-RPG subgenre was created.
The Fallout games were quite a change of pace for Western RPGs. Look no further than the title to see why. Does Fallout sound like a title for a fantastical adventure through a brightly colored magical land? No. It brings to mind a nuclear fallout, and with good reason. The game was set on an earth wherein humanity recently bombed itself into near extinction. Yet despite this depressing backdrop, the game managed to have an excellent – and incredibly morbid – sense of humor with wonderful writing to boot. Both Fallout and its sequel are considered to be two of the greatest Western RPGs of all time, and I'm not inclined to argue.
In 1998, an atomic bomb – figurative, not in the Fallout sense – dropped onto the RPG scene in the form of developer Bioware. Their first game, Baldur's Gate was a gate-smashing success, and prompted a sequel of equal quality. The game played from a third-person person perspective similar to that of Diablo, but its battle system was somewhat turn-based and allowed for more intricate strategies than "click, click, click, dead, repeat." Also, instead of creating a party of characters at the outset, players could find other characters throughout their journey to join their party. The game's story was definitely of the fantasy mold, but it was written far better than anything gaming had produced at the time. The Infinity Engine, on which the game was built, became one of the most prominent PC RPG engines at the time. It powered such cult hits as Icewind Dale and Planetscape: Torment.
With the turn of the millennium came two more masterpieces from Bioware, Neverwinter Nights and Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic. Both games exemplified the Western RPG, but in different ways. Neverwinter was rendered in full 3D, but was still played from an isometric perspective. The single player campaign was, of course, an excellent story set in the D&D universe, but that's not what had all the RPG fans soiling their loins in glee. Instead, the construction system, which gave players the chance to construct their own Neverwinter Nights campaigns was the real draw. Even now, hardcore fans are still creating their own unique worlds and adventures. Star Wars: KOTOR, on the other hand, was a much more developer-focused game – that is to say, there was no construction set; everything about the game was pure Bioware. The story was absolutely terrific, far surpassing anything Star Wars canon had produced in the last 20 years. Its characters were brilliantly developed, and anyone who's played the game can't help but adore the human-loathing droid, HK-47. And not only was KOTOR an incredible game, it aided Morrowind in more or less introducing console – Xbox, in this case -- audiences to the Western RPG, which until that point had been a mostly PC bound experience.
You'll note that I've made no mention of MMORPGs in this article; that's because their history would take another entire article. I haven't decided if I'll actually write it. Make sure to email me if you'd like to see it, however. At this point, you can probably look forward to MMORPG history and hopefully Western RPG present and future in the next installment. When will the next installment be? Well, doesn't mystery make life exciting?
